Healing Hands
by Tricki
Summary: He places a gentle kiss on her temple and all over again it hits him... The only person who really matters to him was almost the one he couldn't save.


I wrote most of this at 2am while watching an episode of the Power Rangers (Don't ask, my uncle was in it! lol) This is my attempt at being spontaneous and different, and using the physical shape of the text on the page **(Maximise the page, please)** - I then discovered that FF lost all my FORMATTING!!!! Man was I pissed, so just ignore the chunks of full stops and please excuse the medical iffyness.

Love to all, especially my House buddies Becs and Addie : D : D where would I be without you?

_Please_ R&R, as usual, writing a House fic scares me more than I can articulate (particularly with this because it's crap...)

**Healing Hands**

**By Tricki**

* * *

He places a feather light kiss on her temple and strokes a silky brown wave of hair. A lump forms in his throat and it's all he can do to control the overwhelming urge wrap his arms around her tightly and never let go – but that would wake her up. _And_ that would be pathetic (not that this isn't fairly pathetic too). But she doesn't know. She doesn't know what those days were like for him, so he has the right to feel this way. 

Still, he hates this.

He hates being vulnerable to her.

But seeing her lying beside him, sleeping peacefully, warm and breathing, overwhelms him, overloads him with emotion.

Because he almost lost her.

Because he almost couldn't fix her – almost couldn't save her. She was almost the one who got away. She's the only one who _matters_ and she almost died.

Because of him.

Because he panicked.

She got sick, she needed him and he panicked and he got conservative because she mattered then too. He couldn't lose her, not then to some shitty pain in the ass infection and not now to anything else that could potentially take her away.

Because now he knows he loves her.

He knew it that day too – the day when she came to him with a migraine and fainted in his arms.

In college he had wanted her, before the infarction he had cared for her, after the infarction he had hated her and after he had hated her he had loved her. No. That wasn't true. After he had hated her he had _realised_ that he was in love with her – that he had always loved her and would always love her. So that day when his name had fallen from her lips as she had fallen into his arms his brain had all but shut down.

The day he had moved her to his Eames chair (because that was as far as his leg would let him carry her) then he had stuck his head out the door and yelled for a nurse.

His best friend had chased that nurse into his office.

Because that tone in his voice…

…had told him something was very wrong. That was confirmed when he saw his boss passed out on his friend's Eames chair, his friend by her side taking her pulse, a million thoughts running through his head.

Those thoughts remained with him while she was moved to a private room…

_Think! Think about this. _You_, of all people, can figure out what's wrong with her_

_But what if I can't?_

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ..._ I should've told her more often_

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... _Once! Once and she was asleep!_

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... **_Coward_**

…And those thoughts had remained with him throughout her entire illness

They had to fight like hell to prevent her organs from failing as the infection began to fully take hold. After four days she was basically on life support and he still was without that all too important epiphany – the epiphany that ultimately determined wether she lived or died.

Then it came.

While he was sitting by her hospital bed, playing idly with her fingers, it struck him.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Irregular heartbeat

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Palpitations

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Migraines

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Respiratory Failure

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Fainting

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Heart attack

What controlled it all?

_The Brain_

Her hypothalamus… If her hypothalamus was "malfunctioning" then her heartbeat wouldn't be maintained, her respiratory rate would be off - if her heart and lungs weren't working properly then her organs weren't getting enough oxygen and lack of oxygen could cause the fainting.

Her Brain

He had squeezed her hand then dropped it back onto the bed as he rushed to his office to find his team – he knew how to treat her.

It hadn't been long before they were able to take her off the respirator and external pacemaker. She woke to him sitting in that same chair – the epiphany chair, playing with her fingers. She managed a weak "Hi", which he returned in a low and shaky exhale (maybe even a sigh of relief), one thought on his mind – _"Thank Christ that worked…"_

She had smiled at him and he had squeezed her hand, brought it to his lips and then told her that he loved her – the first time he had ever said it to her while she was awake. Again that exhausted smile had pulled at her mouth as she said she loved him too. He kissed her lips then glared playfully as he said

"You scared the shit out of me."

"Same to you. I could carry a year's worth of new shoes in the bags under your eyes." She said tiredly, still managing a slight smirk.

"I'm glad you're okay." An amused noise had come from the back of her throat and she muttered

"God you're sweet to me now you're getting some." Before her eyes had fluttered shut and her head lolled slightly to one side as she fell asleep, while he had mused exactly how good 'some' was between the two of them...

That day he had reached out and touched her hair, just as he did mere minutes ago. Aside from the dark circles under her eyes and the sickly pallor of her soft skin, that day she had looked the way she looks now – body slightly curled, head turned away from him, chocolate hair lazily caressing her face. It's at this moment he comes to a realisation – has one of his famous epiphanies

_She_ is vulnerable to him too.

Someone once told him that the greatest act of trust is sleeping in front of someone. And here she sleeps. With him. The thought almost makes him laugh, because he wouldn't trust him if he were her. He still doesn't know how someone like her can love him – or, for that matter, how he can love her. And, sure, they have their moments, their minor battles and their major wars and the days when they strongly consider murdering each other – _"I _am_ a doctor, I could make it look good."_ has crossed both their minds more than once, but somehow they always end up here, at this point, deeply in their own breed of (albeit slightly warped) love.

No one has ever really understood the way they are with each other, the fighting, the sarcasm, the scathing wit; no one sees the love in their eyes when he taunts her or when she teases him.

But they know.

She turns her head to him and her eyes flutter open.

"Good morning." She smiles, her voice low and husky.

"Good morning yourself." He replies, pulling her closer and running a hand down her stomach around to her ass, moving so he's above her, kissing her lovingly yet passionately, smiling at the feeling of her breath on him – again feeling that flush of relief that she's breathing.

"I knew there was a reason you saved my life." She smiles sarcastically as he moves to her collarbone, then kisses his ear.

"Honestly? Those five days without you on my ass about clinic duty…" He steals a deep kiss.

"Were _hell_."

She laughs at him warmly.

"You really _are_ a romantic."

He knows she's joking but in this room, feeling overwhelmed by the fact she's alive, touching her hair and skin with such wonder, kissing her the way he has never kissed anyone else, feeling healed at the touch of her hands, makes him think maybe, around her, some small part of him is.

* * *

Please R&R!!!! 


End file.
